Jane Eyre eBook

“Come, eat something,” she said; but I
put both away from me, feeling as if a drop or a crumb
would have choked me in my present condition.
Helen regarded me, probably with surprise: I
could not now abate my agitation, though I tried hard;
I continued to weep aloud. She sat down on the
ground near me, embraced her knees with her arms,
and rested her head upon them; in that attitude she
remained silent as an Indian. I was the first
who spoke —

“Helen, why do you stay with a girl whom everybody
believes to be a liar?”

“Everybody, Jane? Why, there are only
eighty people who have heard you called so, and the
world contains hundreds of millions.”

“But what have I to do with millions?
The eighty, I know, despise me.”

“Jane, you are mistaken: probably not
one in the school either despises or dislikes you:
many, I am sure, pity you much.”

“How can they pity me after what Mr. Brocklehurst
has said?”

“Mr. Brocklehurst is not a god: nor is
he even a great and admired man: he is little
liked here; he never took steps to make himself liked.
Had he treated you as an especial favourite, you would
have found enemies, declared or covert, all around
you; as it is, the greater number would offer you
sympathy if they dared. Teachers and pupils
may look coldly on you for a day or two, but friendly
feelings are concealed in their hearts; and if you
persevere in doing well, these feelings will ere long
appear so much the more evidently for their temporary
suppression. Besides, Jane” —­
she paused.

“Well, Helen?” said I, putting my hand
into hers: she chafed my fingers gently to warm
them, and went on —

“If all the world hated you, and believed you
wicked, while your own conscience approved you, and
absolved you from guilt, you would not be without
friends.”

“No; I know I should think well of myself; but
that is not enough: if others don’t love
me I would rather die than live —­ I cannot
bear to be solitary and hated, Helen. Look here;
to gain some real affection from you, or Miss Temple,
or any other whom I truly love, I would willingly
submit to have the bone of my arm broken, or to let
a bull toss me, or to stand behind a kicking horse,
and let it dash its hoof at my chest —­ "

“Hush, Jane! you think too much of the love
of human beings; you are too impulsive, too vehement;
the sovereign hand that created your frame, and put
life into it, has provided you with other resources
than your feeble self, or than creatures feeble as
you. Besides this earth, and besides the race
of men, there is an invisible world and a kingdom
of spirits: that world is round us, for it is
everywhere; and those spirits watch us, for they are
commissioned to guard us; and if we were dying in
pain and shame, if scorn smote us on all sides, and
hatred crushed us, angels see our tortures, recognise
our innocence (if innocent we be: as I know you
are of this charge which Mr. Brocklehurst has weakly
and pompously repeated at second-hand from Mrs. Reed;
for I read a sincere nature in your ardent eyes and
on your clear front), and God waits only the separation
of spirit from flesh to crown us with a full reward.
Why, then, should we ever sink overwhelmed with distress,
when life is so soon over, and death is so certain
an entrance to happiness —­ to glory?”